When you receive your new French Bulldog puppy, he/she will be accustomed to eating PawTree salmon, sweet potato, and pea all-life-stages chow. Puppies are changing and growing rapidly, and they should eat at least 3 times a day to provide all the proper nourishment and nutrition for their quickly growing bodies. Feed your puppy on a regular schedule in the morning, mid-day, and evening. We recommend giving them more than they can consume and then taking it away after they have finished eating. This will make their house training go much more smoothly as they will need to relieve themselves within 30 minutes of having eaten. Make sure your Frenchie always has access to fresh water through out the day.
Once your Frenchie is a few months old, you can feed them a couple of times per day, or, if they are completely house broken, you can leave food out for them at all times so that they can just eat when they are hungry. Based on our experience, very few Frenchies will overeat, even when free fed, and they will maintain a good weight. If you do happen to have a glutton, you can put out a specific amount of food for them per day, and adjust this quantity as necessary for them to maintain a good weight.
There is a guide on the food bag that tells you how much to feed your puppy at a given weight. This is only a rough guide depending on activity level, etc., and you may need to decrease or increase the quantity based on how quickly your pup is gaining weight and whether he/she finishes all the food at one time. It’s hard to say exactly how much your Frenchie pup will need, but the recommended amounts on the bag will give you an idea of where to start.
We believe PawTree has wonderful products and we recommend that you keep your puppy on one or more of their excellent products for life. These are all-life-stages products so there is no need to start with a puppy chow and then transition over to an adult chow. However, if you would like to use another high-quality chow, the transition should be made gradually so as not to upset your puppies digestive system which could cause loose stool or diarrhea.
For puppy chow, we strongly recommend a high protein (at least 26%), high fat (at least 16%), and high fiber (at least 4%) dry chow that has meat as the first ingredient(s). For an adult chow, you can get by with a percentage or two less on the protein and fat content, but unless you have a weight problem with your dog, generally the higher the protein and fat content the better. Avoid any chows which contains wheat, corn, and soy fillers as they can be harder on your puppy’s digestive system and organs, and they can also make him/her gassy. Generally, chow with brown rice &/or oat groats are fine, as are peas, chickpeas, barley, lentils, and garbanzo beans. However, we love the grain free chows from PawTree which use sweet potato. All of the various meats are good, although if you have a very food sensitive Frenchie, turkey or duck are generally better than chicken, and fish can sometimes cause issues. We’ve also had good luck with lamb for a change of pace, but we use a salmon recipe 75% of the time (we believe fish oil has a lot of healthy properties).
If you are feeding your Frenchie a high quality chow, you can probably get by without special supplements. However, to be sure that your Frenchie is getting all of the nutrients he/she needs to maintain a strong, healthy body and good coat, we recommend giving him/her a NuVet tablet every day (we recommend 1/4 tablet per day for puppies under 3 months, 1/2 tablet per day for puppies up to 6 months, and then a whole tablet per day thereafter). Our Frenchies love them like they are treats. NuVet has made a noticeable improvement in our kennel, especially with our pregnant and whelping females.
We were told about this supplement by a breeder friend of ours who obtained fantastic results in her kennel by using this supplement every day with each of her dogs. She said she solved several problems (from skin rashes to low milk production in mothers, along with several other nagging health issues) when she started giving each dog in her kennel one of these supplements daily. We believe you and your Frenchie will also benefit from these outstanding supplements which you can find detailed under “Great Products”. When you use the number provided you can purchase these supplements at a significantly discounted rate versus the retail cost.
We also believe in the use of pre- and probiotics, and we have had very good luck with a new tablet that is on the market from MaxiVet. You can also find this product on our website under Great Products. These tablets are designed for puppies 3 months old and older for life to help maintain good gut health, which has a significant impact on overall health.
Another great thing about both the NuVet and the MaxiVet tablets is that they can be given to your dogs as treats and they will gobble them down, kind of like giving your child a piece of fruit for a treat instead of a cookie.
